The Path of Exile Website has patch notes for a new version 0.10.1 update that's now live in the beta of Grinding Gears' action/RPG (thanks Wowbagger_TIP). The new version adds new features and content along with bug fixes and balance changes. Here are the patch notes:

Version 0.10.1
Features/Content:

All skill gems and support gems have received new art.

The 3d artwork for many shields has been substantially updated and improved.

Overhauled most of the sound effects so that they use pitch and volume variations to avoid being repetitive.

Added new music for the Act Three boss fight.

Improved all of the Duelist's animations.

The Unique bow Death's Harp now has a particle effect for its custom art.

Updated and shrunk the visual size of Frenzy, Endurance and Power charges.

Added magic-only skeletons for the Map necro boss that can raise magic monsters.

Pressing the alt (or highlight) key in trade while hovering an item now says "item level" rather than "level" to make it clearer.

On-hit effects can now apply even if they deal no damage.

Renamed "Angel Kite Shield" to "Angelic Kite Shield".

Overhauled the zombie audio.

Improved blood effects.

Continued to incrementally improve the art, effects, environments and sound.

Maps which had the same level topologies as other maps now have their own new layouts.

The Labyrinthine mod now provides a more consistent increase in maps and is comparable to the Massive mod on applicable maps.

Some existing maps have had their bosses changed or reworked.

Some recipes for upgrading maps produce a different map than they did previously.

Balance Changes:

Stun Threshold Reduction now has diminishing returns when it exceeds 75%. It's still possible to build very effective stun characters, but they cannot permanently lock down the hardest of bosses.

Increased the non-percentage Armour values on item mods to be the same as Evasion.

Boss totems now do more damage with Spark.

Increased the damage that Perpetus deals with Ethereal Knives.

Bug Fixes:

Fixed a bug where monsters affected by the Energy Shield aura would get too much Energy Shield in multiplayer games.

Fixed a bug with where social status messages could wrap around incorrectly.

Fixed a bug where players could not right click offline players on the friends list.

Fixed a bug where the Stun Threshold Reduction on Mortem Morsu was not limited to just attacks by that weapon.

Fixed a server crash related to currency items.

Fixed a server crash that would occur involving Bear Traps.

If you have a full microtransaction stash and purchase an additional microtransaction, a new microtransaction tab will now be added. This currently only works if you are not logged into the game client at the time. The addition of microtransaction stashes while you are logged in will be fixed in a future patch.

OpticNerve wrote on Feb 14, 2013, 18:39:The game's quite fun and has a lot of elements that I do enjoy but I really do hope they they work a bit more on the combat animations and especially give a boost to melee skills and rethink the passive skill tree placement of the Duelist class in particular.

Right now it's pretty well-known that melee builds are screwed after a certain point unless they pick up melee skill gems that have a ranged component to them (ie. ground slam and lightning strike) and even then, those simply can't compete with ranged, totem or caster builds.

Along with that, the Duelist seriously needs a reworking. They're placed in such a bad spot that the Marauder, Ranger or even the Shadow can do what the Duelist does but better and at the cost of less skill points in order to grab the important keystones. As it currently is, the Duelist is the worst class out of them all simply due to his placement on the passive tree.

Lots of people mirror those comments about the duelist. Little do they know the Armor/Evasion/ duelist has the most potential to be the top dog on HC. Very gear dependent, even moreso than others -- which is why it's taking me some time to be noticed on the HC ladder as I farm with mid-high lev chars building him up as he goes. You read it here first, before any 'streaming' or whatnot.

The game's quite fun and has a lot of elements that I do enjoy but I really do hope they they work a bit more on the combat animations and especially give a boost to melee skills and rethink the passive skill tree placement of the Duelist class in particular.

Right now it's pretty well-known that melee builds are screwed after a certain point unless they pick up melee skill gems that have a ranged component to them (ie. ground slam and lightning strike) and even then, those simply can't compete with ranged, totem or caster builds.

Along with that, the Duelist seriously needs a reworking. They're placed in such a bad spot that the Marauder, Ranger or even the Shadow can do what the Duelist does but better and at the cost of less skill points in order to grab the important keystones. As it currently is, the Duelist is the worst class out of them all simply due to his placement on the passive tree.

Been a few months since I played, the improvements are nice. I don't get involved in the this is better than that from month to month, but I can say the game feels better. The drops are better, the monster spawns are better, everything is making more sense in the game.

I am mostly a solo guy, I enjoy doing my own thing, looking at stuff, comparing things. I have item ADD. It is different than D3, which is perfect. I enjoy both games for what they are.

NoodleFish wrote on Feb 13, 2013, 18:24:I'm loving the game - only been playing for about a week, but it seems to have my number. I usually get to early 30's and end up getting killed (hardcore). Act III is greater than me I suppose.

Oh well - off to make another go at it!

I rotate between characters, have a set of low level farming gear (strong MF w health) to get each char to 40s then flesh them out as I find equipment. That's the best advice I can give if you want to progress safely in HC solo, as solo is the only way to determine the true potential of your build.

The other safe way is to snake by in groups as its extremely easy to progress in groups. Then farm fells merci till you get the gear to support whatever build you envision. Often you'll find you can't do what you hoped to do solo, and end up rerolling or dying.

Yes, that's a very good site but always double check the date stamp of when the last update was made. I've run in to a couple threads which were picked up when the last update of the OP was greater than a week and was bumped by someone asking about availability.

Great site in any case! Pair it with http://www.poeex.info/ and you have a decent way to make a trade unless wants/needs is established as a buyout price.

Beelzebud wrote on Feb 13, 2013, 17:26:I've tried playing this game, but it has a nasty habit of just randomly causing my PC to reboot. No other games do this.

If you have a Sound Blaster X-Fi, this is solved by running the game with the --softwareaudio command line argument. (Note the two -'s.) The game is triggering a bug in Creative's drivers. Unfortunately the devs don't seem terribly interested in coming up with a better fix, but at least this workaround works 100% and doesn't compromise the audio quality.

Holy crap dude, you nailed it. Creative X-Fi user here. I even looked on their forums and didn't find much info. I'm going to try this the next time I'm in the mood to play it.

Verno wrote on Feb 13, 2013, 13:46:I think Diablo 3 hits all the right notes on presentation but that's where it stops for me. Skills are very visceral and have impact, there is great feedback on taking and receiving damage, stuff like that. They have the benefit of an army of animators, modelers and programmers just to baby sit the visual experience and honestly it is really well done for the most part.

That's one of things Blizzard gets right in all their games. The games just feel and sound "right" even going back to Orcs and Humans. It's a really underrated aspect of quality games IMO. Floatiness is a huge turnoff.

Beelzebud wrote on Feb 13, 2013, 17:26:I've tried playing this game, but it has a nasty habit of just randomly causing my PC to reboot. No other games do this.

If you have a Sound Blaster X-Fi, this is solved by running the game with the --softwareaudio command line argument. (Note the two -'s.) The game is triggering a bug in Creative's drivers. Unfortunately the devs don't seem terribly interested in coming up with a better fix, but at least this workaround works 100% and doesn't compromise the audio quality.

Verno wrote on Feb 13, 2013, 14:45:Also helpful on the wiki is the page with zones that have waypoints handy, I always forget that shit. This page with the list of quest rewards is nice too so you can make alts to get the skill gems you want or etc.

Yeah, it took me awhile to memorize the WPs, the wiki was handy for that.

The skill gems thing is a bit weird - as quest rewards I mean. I see so many people trying to buy Clarity (and admittedly it's a staple for a lot of builds), but it seems so easy to get. Start a new alt (witch) on a second computer (or virtual machine, whatever), log in your main, WP to Brutus, kill Brutus with main (with alt hiding in the area), go back to town and you've got a Clarity. Do that a few dozen times and you've got plenty to trade.

Bruhnic is right in many aspects, but mainly with HC characters. They spent over a year fleshing out the first 2 acts and balances then added the 3rd with very little testing aside from alpha -- which is the real reason you cannot afford to lack in the defense dept.

However it doesn't limit build options too much, but definitely makes you take a whole lot more defense than it should and is VERY gear dependent.

Also, once you come to grips with the system a bit more, you'll make specialized builds for different areas or farming or pvp which don't include the limitations you have for progression.

The link Verno linked is the one, think you just add the .hardcore. before the domain name iirc.